Commonplace 147 George & The Pig and Whistle.
The Pig and Whistle is one of George's slighter, more unconvincing and improbable short stories, from The House of Cobwebs, the collection published after his death. Nothing much happens in it and no great nuggets of insight or wisdom are imparted - it's a bland piece in a very low key. Download for free here click.
Though it is set in a small country pub, it seems to have been conjured up by someone with limited experience of the publican trade, written for people who have never ventured out of a large conurbation and who probably nurse romantic, idealised views on what constitutes 'country life'. However, it does contain one of those very rare Gissing gems: a more or less happy ending, though the author can't come out and say as much.
It concerns a maths teacher, Mr Ruddiman, who exploits the vulnerability of a thirty-something spinster, Ms Fouracres, who lives in a country pub with her dipsomaniac father, the landlord of the Pig and Whistle. Maths man's strong maths point is setting his pupils problems to solve that focus on budgets and economics. He is generally dissatisfied with his position in life, partly because he has no prospects for advancement in his school, and he is 45 years old. Underachievement is his middle name, but he is shrewd enough to not look a gift horse in the mouth when it arrives in the shape of Ms. Fouracres. He has visited the inn as a day tripper, but then one summer, he decides to spend his holidays in the Pig and Whistle inn, a very small establishment situated on the outskirts of the town of Woodbury. (Presumably, not to be confused with the picturesque Devon village of Woodbury, a place George knew well.) Though Ruddiman - a name guaranteed to be mocked mercilessly by his students - can hardly be said to have his eye on Ms Fouracres at the start of his holiday, he spends quite a bit of time talking to her. His interest is not captured by her physical attributes (she doesn't have any), or her cracking conversation (ditto) but because she can run a small country pub with a certain amount of aplomb. And she always refers to him as 'sir', so she knows her place - or, as George said that his second wife didn't, she 'knew which side of her bread is buttered'.
Old Fouracres has an unbelievable fixed idea that he once met the Prince of Wales, but this part of the story is so dumb and dull, we need not linger on it. It is really only a device to 1) get him out of the pub overnight (and Ruddiman's hair so he can have a turn behind the bar to see if he likes the publican trade); 2) kill him off, and leave the single daughter with the prospect of running the pub on her own. George lets us know Ms Fouracres is a good housekeeper (did he ever see a woman he couldn't classify by her home-making skills??) who can balance the books and work with an eye to eeking out a limited budget - George's kind of gal. She is a Superwoman who can tend the garden and guard the poultry (and despatch them with her bare hands no doubt); according to her creator 'demonstrative mirth was not one of her characteristics'.
On the night the landlord goes off gallivanting after the Prince of Wales, Ruddiman helps out behind the bar. And, when the cat's away, the mice do play. He finds he has a liking for the work. George's usual contempt for shop-keeping doesn't kick in, but we have the snobbery he represents when Ms Fouracres makes the distinction that her father has bad-mouthed the pub by calling it a 'pot-house' whereas she prefers to call it an inn. After all, it has two rooms for rent. Ruddiman, the creep, agrees, because he is a rampant snob like Ms Fouracres (and their creator), and he is on the make. The more he gets his feet under her table, the more he likes the thought of running a country inn.
Then sudden news comes that the father is dead. In what is probably the least convincing element of the tale, old Mr Fouracres has drowned in a pond (what is it with George and drownings?? Many of his tales feature death by water). His daughter hardly misses a beat when she finds out - just a slight touch of weeping, as befits a (would-be) lady. There is no sign she is bereaved or distressed, after she returns from claiming/identifying the corpse. Luckily, distant relations deal with the messy bit of the wake and burial (he owned a pub, died within a day's travel of it, and yet the wake is conducted miles from home!), but maybe Ms F is a cold fish and has no familial feelings.
But George does not allow the grass to grow under Ruddiman's feet. Very swiftly, after assessing that a mere woman can't possibly function without a man and assuming she hasn't got the wit to employ one to do the heavy lifting, he makes her an offer she can't refuse: he will ditch the teaching and join her in running the inn/pot-house as her assistant. She demurs, so he ratchets up the pressure and, though it isn't stated baldly, we assume he proposes marriage, they join together in matrimony or its approximate, and ride off into the sunset, together.
So what are we to make of this tale? Contentment at one's lot in life is not really George's creative world, is it? The Pig and Whistle is a mini Henry Ryecroft scenario - George, convincing himself that he might enjoy a quiet life in the back of beyond selling beer to random tourists and uncouth locals - with a woman he doesn't love by his side. Tosh, of course, because he never sought out such an existence out of the story (with the exception of having a woman he didn't love by his side haha). Unrealistically, how could they make a living - you would expect a mathematical wizard who loved drawing up fictional national budgets might have realised that. Ruddiman seems to like the stronger female - was George ever hankering after an assertive Wonder Woman to become an assistant to himself, a sort of PA to his talent? This story was written when he was shacked up with Gabrielle Fleury, so perhaps he expected her to step up to that particular plate?
What about the coded names? George liked to give his characters names that held a secret insight - Ruddiman could be a red man (ie red-faced, bucolic, a typical country bumpkin) or it could be an allusion to the British swear word 'ruddy' which is an anodyne form of its rhyming swear word, 'bloody'. Fouracres may be a shrunken version of the mythic 'Forty acres and a mule' associated with the emancipation of the slaves in the US click. We never get to know their first names.
And the Pig and Whistle pub name?
Here (click and click) we see these two terms might originate from a number of sources.
The Pig might be a drinking vessel and the Whistle a bastardization of 'to wassail' - meaning to party party. As you can see from the above Butlin's post cards, partying is close to the hearts of all Brits. And, partying was very much the domain of the Butlin's internment - er, I mean holiday - camps click patronised by the working class, back in the day. These were quintessentially British, like Carry On films, Morrissey, the thwack of leather on willow, Wall's ice cream, warm beer, green suburbs, dog lovers, and old maids cycling to holy communion through the morning mist... oo, er, I'm channeling former PM John Major now. Time to go.
For George Orwell's views on the Great British Pub click
The Pig and Whistle is one of George's slighter, more unconvincing and improbable short stories, from The House of Cobwebs, the collection published after his death. Nothing much happens in it and no great nuggets of insight or wisdom are imparted - it's a bland piece in a very low key. Download for free here click.
Though it is set in a small country pub, it seems to have been conjured up by someone with limited experience of the publican trade, written for people who have never ventured out of a large conurbation and who probably nurse romantic, idealised views on what constitutes 'country life'. However, it does contain one of those very rare Gissing gems: a more or less happy ending, though the author can't come out and say as much.
It concerns a maths teacher, Mr Ruddiman, who exploits the vulnerability of a thirty-something spinster, Ms Fouracres, who lives in a country pub with her dipsomaniac father, the landlord of the Pig and Whistle. Maths man's strong maths point is setting his pupils problems to solve that focus on budgets and economics. He is generally dissatisfied with his position in life, partly because he has no prospects for advancement in his school, and he is 45 years old. Underachievement is his middle name, but he is shrewd enough to not look a gift horse in the mouth when it arrives in the shape of Ms. Fouracres. He has visited the inn as a day tripper, but then one summer, he decides to spend his holidays in the Pig and Whistle inn, a very small establishment situated on the outskirts of the town of Woodbury. (Presumably, not to be confused with the picturesque Devon village of Woodbury, a place George knew well.) Though Ruddiman - a name guaranteed to be mocked mercilessly by his students - can hardly be said to have his eye on Ms Fouracres at the start of his holiday, he spends quite a bit of time talking to her. His interest is not captured by her physical attributes (she doesn't have any), or her cracking conversation (ditto) but because she can run a small country pub with a certain amount of aplomb. And she always refers to him as 'sir', so she knows her place - or, as George said that his second wife didn't, she 'knew which side of her bread is buttered'.
Old Fouracres has an unbelievable fixed idea that he once met the Prince of Wales, but this part of the story is so dumb and dull, we need not linger on it. It is really only a device to 1) get him out of the pub overnight (and Ruddiman's hair so he can have a turn behind the bar to see if he likes the publican trade); 2) kill him off, and leave the single daughter with the prospect of running the pub on her own. George lets us know Ms Fouracres is a good housekeeper (did he ever see a woman he couldn't classify by her home-making skills??) who can balance the books and work with an eye to eeking out a limited budget - George's kind of gal. She is a Superwoman who can tend the garden and guard the poultry (and despatch them with her bare hands no doubt); according to her creator 'demonstrative mirth was not one of her characteristics'.
On the night the landlord goes off gallivanting after the Prince of Wales, Ruddiman helps out behind the bar. And, when the cat's away, the mice do play. He finds he has a liking for the work. George's usual contempt for shop-keeping doesn't kick in, but we have the snobbery he represents when Ms Fouracres makes the distinction that her father has bad-mouthed the pub by calling it a 'pot-house' whereas she prefers to call it an inn. After all, it has two rooms for rent. Ruddiman, the creep, agrees, because he is a rampant snob like Ms Fouracres (and their creator), and he is on the make. The more he gets his feet under her table, the more he likes the thought of running a country inn.
Then sudden news comes that the father is dead. In what is probably the least convincing element of the tale, old Mr Fouracres has drowned in a pond (what is it with George and drownings?? Many of his tales feature death by water). His daughter hardly misses a beat when she finds out - just a slight touch of weeping, as befits a (would-be) lady. There is no sign she is bereaved or distressed, after she returns from claiming/identifying the corpse. Luckily, distant relations deal with the messy bit of the wake and burial (he owned a pub, died within a day's travel of it, and yet the wake is conducted miles from home!), but maybe Ms F is a cold fish and has no familial feelings.
But George does not allow the grass to grow under Ruddiman's feet. Very swiftly, after assessing that a mere woman can't possibly function without a man and assuming she hasn't got the wit to employ one to do the heavy lifting, he makes her an offer she can't refuse: he will ditch the teaching and join her in running the inn/pot-house as her assistant. She demurs, so he ratchets up the pressure and, though it isn't stated baldly, we assume he proposes marriage, they join together in matrimony or its approximate, and ride off into the sunset, together.
So what are we to make of this tale? Contentment at one's lot in life is not really George's creative world, is it? The Pig and Whistle is a mini Henry Ryecroft scenario - George, convincing himself that he might enjoy a quiet life in the back of beyond selling beer to random tourists and uncouth locals - with a woman he doesn't love by his side. Tosh, of course, because he never sought out such an existence out of the story (with the exception of having a woman he didn't love by his side haha). Unrealistically, how could they make a living - you would expect a mathematical wizard who loved drawing up fictional national budgets might have realised that. Ruddiman seems to like the stronger female - was George ever hankering after an assertive Wonder Woman to become an assistant to himself, a sort of PA to his talent? This story was written when he was shacked up with Gabrielle Fleury, so perhaps he expected her to step up to that particular plate?
What about the coded names? George liked to give his characters names that held a secret insight - Ruddiman could be a red man (ie red-faced, bucolic, a typical country bumpkin) or it could be an allusion to the British swear word 'ruddy' which is an anodyne form of its rhyming swear word, 'bloody'. Fouracres may be a shrunken version of the mythic 'Forty acres and a mule' associated with the emancipation of the slaves in the US click. We never get to know their first names.
And the Pig and Whistle pub name?
Here (click and click) we see these two terms might originate from a number of sources.
The Pig might be a drinking vessel and the Whistle a bastardization of 'to wassail' - meaning to party party. As you can see from the above Butlin's post cards, partying is close to the hearts of all Brits. And, partying was very much the domain of the Butlin's internment - er, I mean holiday - camps click patronised by the working class, back in the day. These were quintessentially British, like Carry On films, Morrissey, the thwack of leather on willow, Wall's ice cream, warm beer, green suburbs, dog lovers, and old maids cycling to holy communion through the morning mist... oo, er, I'm channeling former PM John Major now. Time to go.
For George Orwell's views on the Great British Pub click
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